{"id":145888,"date":"2020-08-21T07:41:57","date_gmt":"2020-08-21T11:41:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/wordpress\/?p=145888"},"modified":"2020-08-21T11:36:43","modified_gmt":"2020-08-21T15:36:43","slug":"just-a-half-an-hour-flight-away-dr-needs-to-focus-on-attracting-tourists-from-puerto-rico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/2020\/08\/21\/just-a-half-an-hour-flight-away-dr-needs-to-focus-on-attracting-tourists-from-puerto-rico\/","title":{"rendered":"Just a half an hour flight away: DR needs to focus on attracting tourists from Puerto Rico"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"600\" height=\"364\" src=\"https:\/\/dr1.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/Turistas-El-Dia-e1593618355981.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-143425\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Puerto Rico travel agents want to see a return to business with the Dominican Republic. As reported in Weekly Journal, an affiliate with El Vocero, the Puerto Rican daily, reports that &#8220;this year&#8217;s summer business was all but lost&#8221;. From a usual 60,000 Puerto Ricans booking vacations at Punta Cana hotels, this has dropped to around 2,000. Losses are estimated at US$10 million for Puerto Rican travel agencies<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Daphne Barbeito said that Punta Cana has traditional lead travel sales locally between the months of May to August. He explained the season was &#8220;totally lost&#8221; this year due to Covid-19. &#8220;No planes were promoted, nor were planes chartered to create a more attractive offering. The impact on the agencies has been very strong. We went to almost zero,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Statistics show that after the reopening of borders in July 2020, the DR received 46.207 American tourists, 1,856 Puerto Ricans and 1,709 Spaniards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Manuel Franceschini, president of the Puerto Rican Travel Agencies Association (APAV), says that they continue to bet on the Dominican Republic as a key destination for Puerto Ricans despite the situation. &#8220;It is still a good alternative because it is a short half-hour flight, which is less risky than being locked in a plane for long hours,&#8221; he stated as reported in Weekly Journal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;The European market and some Caribbean islands have not yet opened to American citizens, cruises are paralyzed, and Disney is not an option. Dominican Republic is open,&#8221; Franceschini affirmed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Read more:<br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theweeklyjournal.com\/business\/drop-in-dominican-republic-tourism-affects-puerto-rico\/article_24ab5c64-e2f0-11ea-9ba7-a7e5b20f4f63.html\">Weekly Journal <\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>21 August 2020<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Puerto Rico travel agents want to see a return to business with the Dominican Republic. As reported in Weekly Journal, an affiliate with El Vocero, the Puerto Rican daily, reports that &#8220;this year&#8217;s summer business was all but lost&#8221;. From a usual 60,000 Puerto Ricans booking vacations at Punta Cana hotels, this has dropped to &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/2020\/08\/21\/just-a-half-an-hour-flight-away-dr-needs-to-focus-on-attracting-tourists-from-puerto-rico\/\" class=\"more-link\">Read more\u2026<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[272,15],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145888"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145888"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145888\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":145934,"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145888\/revisions\/145934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145888"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145888"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dr1.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145888"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}